Product displays, such as merchandisers, are frequently used in retail environments to display products for sale. It is advantageous for these product displays to be configured to provide consumers easy access to the displayed product, to display the product cleanly and in an unobstructed manner so that product brands are readily visible and the store shelves look full or stocked at most times (also known as fronting), and to facilitate easy installation and restocking or reloading by store employees. To accomplish this, many different forms of displays have been developed that are front-facing or self-facing. For example, there are shelf management systems that mount directly on the shelf, bar mounted systems that replace shelves and suspend from a bar, grid-mounted systems that replace shelves and suspend from a grid system. In addition, there are often two versions of these systems: one gravity fed and the other utilizing a biased pusher or paddle to push the stocked product forward as items are removed from a shelf.
Another benefit of these types of displays is that they are typically setup to keep the inventory as new and fresh as possible and to sell off all existing inventory before allowing newer or replacement product to be purchased (e.g., a concept often referred to as “first in first out”). Without these systems, retailers and/or product suppliers are forced to spend much more time and resources (and therefore money) on monitoring, organizing and fronting displayed product and typically end up doing so in a less efficient manner with less desirable results, such as having newer product stocked by hand in front of older product increasing the likelihood of spoilage or product failing to be sold by the “sell by” date and incurring much more labor expense.
One problem with conventional merchandisers is that they typically require being loaded from the front because there is no rear access to the display once installed (e.g., gondolas are placed back-to-back preventing rear access to same). For perishable products, this requires pulling out the already stocked product, loading new product, and then placing the old product back in the front of the merchandiser to ensure “first in first out” is followed to reduce spoilage. This can be a time-consuming process and results in increased spoliation if not done correctly each and every time, thereby costing stores money (both for damaged/lost product and lost sales).
In addition, conventional tray or drawer type merchandisers require the displayed product to be pressed against pushers during stocking/restocking which can make the merchandiser harder to stock/restock and can cause damage to the product being stocked/restocked (e.g., damaged product packaging) depending on how much force is exerted against the product between the person stocking/restocking the displayed product and the pushers of the merchandiser. Damaged product packaging can also result in lost sales. Even conventional pull-out trays that attempt to provide store associates with greater access to the rear of the product channel only extend out part way from their mounting structure (e.g., approximately 25%-33% extension from the mounting structure) which may not be enough room to allow for efficient stocking/restocking of the merchandiser.
Some conventional merchandisers also allow for stacked product to be merchandised in one product channel, but they do so in a way that requires the product to be pulled from the merchandiser in a particular manner or stocked in a particular manner. This hinders the merchandiser from being used with different types of product in the product stacks and/or makes it more inefficient for the consumer to get to a desired product and/or the store associate to stock/restock the merchandiser.
Conventional product and merchandisers also fail to provide efficient ways for packaging, transporting and/or loading product. Typically, product is packaged in a conventional package, such as a box, and store associates are required to remove from the box enough product to load the merchandiser and then return the partially empty box back to the backroom to use at a later date when the merchandiser has emptied enough to stock the remaining product from the box or package. This results in an inefficient usage of the store associate's time and can result in partially emptied boxes being overlooked and other cases being open, thereby, not following the desired first in first out inventory process meant to reduce or eliminate spoilage.
Conventional merchandisers are configured and setup in a display area to display product alongside one another in well-defined rows and columns, which is not always the most efficient use of space for products on display. Often times this can yield less densely packed display areas that fail to maximize product pack-out in that area (e.g., horizontal pack-out, vertical pack-out, or both). Given how valuable space is in most retailers'stores, any improvement to product pack-out within a display area typically frees-up space to add additional product offerings and is thus greatly desired by the retailers and consumers alike. This problem is also often exacerbated by conventional merchandisers that take a one-size fits all approach. Some tray merchandisers do offer adjustable width features to try and customize the size of the merchandiser to the size of the particular product being displayed to help pack-out, but even these merchandisers are limited in what they can do because they lack the ability to be truly customized to the products being displayed.
Accordingly, it has been determined that a need exists for improved product display merchandisers that address and/or solve the aforesaid problems with conventional merchandisers both via new apparatus and new methods relating to same.
Elements in the figures are illustrated for simplicity and clarity and have not necessarily been drawn to scale or to include all features, options or attachments. For example, the dimensions and/or relative positioning of some of the elements in the figures may be exaggerated relative to other elements to help to improve understanding of various embodiments of the present invention. Also, common but well-understood elements that are useful or necessary in a commercially feasible embodiment are often not depicted in order to facilitate a less obstructed view of these various embodiments of the present invention. Certain actions and/or steps may be described or depicted in a particular order of occurrence while those skilled in the art will understand that such specificity with respect to sequence is not actually required. The terms and expressions used herein have the ordinary technical meaning as is accorded to such terms and expressions by persons skilled in the technical field as set forth above except where different specific meanings have otherwise been set forth herein.